Monika Platzer: Cold War and Architecture. The Competing Forces that Reshaped Austria after 1945

After the liberation of Austria in spring 1945 and the partitioning of the territory by the four victorious powers – Great Britain, France, the USA, and the Soviet Union – Vienna became a central stage for the Cold War. Unlike Germany, Austria is not generally perceived as a battleground for politicized debates on architecture during the Cold War period. During the occupation, Austria transformed from an authoritarian governing system into a democratic consumer society. After liberation by the Allied forces, each of the four occupying powers brought its own diverse cultural program to the country. Great Britain, France, the United States, and the Soviet Union utilized architectural exhibitions as a platform for cultural, ideological, economic, and technological transfer. The exhibited architectural works and accompanying discourse became instruments of the “educational program” for creating a new world and social order, reflecting the global competition of the Cold War.

The cultural-political measures of the victors became a catalyst for their ideological blending. Research into cultural campaigns across all four occupying powers reveals their different approaches. Alongside their respective political interests, the Allied powers’ cultural activities were aimed at influencing various target groups. However, these measures often clashed with local traditions, heterogeneous interest groups, and networks that utilized cultural transfer and the conflicting potential of the Cold War for their own professional development.

The lecture is a call to anchor a supranational perspective on national narratives, emphasizing the need to transform the canon of perspectives on post-war architectural history.

Monika Platzer studied art history at the University of Vienna. She serves as a curator at the Architekturzentrum Wien (AzW) and head of its collection department. Her research focus is on the cultural history of the 20th century. Her experience also includes international curatorial work at leading institutions such as the Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA) and the Getty Research Institute (GRI). Among the exhibitions she has prepared are: 'Vienna. The Pearl of the Reich.' Planning for Hitler (2005); a_show: Austrian Architecture in the 20th and 21st Centuries (AzW, permanent exhibition); Lessons from Bernard Rudolfsky (2007–2008); Kinetism. Vienna Discovers the Avant-Garde (2006); and Shaping the Great City: Modern Architecture in Central Europe 1890–1937 (1999–2001). Monika Platzer teaches at the University of Vienna and the Vienna University of Technology; she is an editor of the journal icamprint, published by the International Confederation of Architectural Museums. In 2014, she was a visiting fellow at the Center for European Studies at Harvard University. Her current research focuses on the transnational history of architecture.